BLACK WATER

The Archie Wildcrafts—young, good-looking, sweet-natured—had joined in a marriage that seemed destined for the long haul. Then suddenly, she’s shot dead, and for a while he’s nearer dead than alive, a bullet lodged in his brain. Though he beats the odds and survives, the investigators of the Orange County Sheriff’s department find the case taking shape in a way they hate, as a murder and an unsuccessful suicide, with the alleged perpetrator, Deputy Archie, one of their own. To Sergeant Merci Rayborn, however, the whole deal screams frame. Yes, there’s Gwen’s blood on Archie’s bathrobe and Archie’s fingerprints on the murder weapon, but to Merci, weaned by her mentors on the bedrock idea that “there’s a lot more to a homicide case than fingerprints,” it’s all off-kilter. From the outset, her detective’s instincts have seized on an essential truth: Archie loved Gwen and couldn’t have killed her. In the meantime, an ambitious, headline-hunting DA, sensing an easy conviction, wants Archie before a grand jury. Merci resists, stalls, maneuvers. Sniffing here and there, she finally gets a whiff of a money trail that leads to a pair of ruthless Russian wiseguys whose impact on Gwen was both surprising and pernicious. But Merci’s not their only stalker. Turns out that a pair of vengeful ghosts are along for the ride.

Parker (Silent Joe, 2001, etc.) scores again with a heroine whose steely toughness is leavened by warmth and vulnerability. It’s a pleasure to spend time with her.